Three years after he charmed audiences with the beautifully low-key
Dum Laga Ke Haisha, writer-director Sharat Katariya returns with another delightful drama set in a similar working class milieu. Instead of a romance, though, this time around Katariya tells the story of an entrepreneurial couple determined to find their way to success.

The story is fairly straightforward, and even a bit predictable, perhaps – when she witnesses her peon husband Mauji (Varun Dhawan) being made to playact as a dog to entertain his bosses at a wedding, Mamta (Anushka Sharma) pushes him to quit and become something on his own, especially since he is a talented tailor-designer coming from a lineage of such artisans. Quit, he does, and the husband-wife duo start their march to success, encountering a host of trials and tribulations in unsympathetic parents, crafty relatives and a general lack of resources as they establish their own brand of
Sui Dhaaga apparels, all “mad” in India, as the two frequently note.

Katariya is very familiar with the story he wants to tell and it shows in the way he sets it up, drawing up protagonists and settings that ring very true, as well as a prudent script that wastes very little time in relaying unnecessary details. Mauji and Mamta are hardly your typical Hindi film couple – battling the drudgery of daily life, they have little time for any romantic cutaways. Forget choreographed song and dance numbers, the closest these two get to being a typical Bollywood couple is in a stolen moment on a crowded bus where the seated passengers sway in tandem with the background score.

Instead, Katariya focuses on making Mauji and Mamta an equal pair, spurring each other on – Mamta moves from being a housewife taking care of her in-laws to being the driving force behind Mauji’s move into independence.

The other characters, especially Mauji’s parents, played to flawlessly by Raghubir Yadav and Yamini Dass, are etched out beautifully too. Yadav as the cynical father who only wants to see his son gainfully employed is note-perfect, while Dass is simply adorable as Mauji’s silent mother who is content to look after the household and order her daughter-in-law through chores.

Katariya sets his story on the outskirts of the national capital region, and once again shows off his skill for capturing the humdrum of daily life there with a certain beauty. He injects a certain flourish into the dreariness of everyday, making even cycle and bus rides watchable, just for the characters. The dialogue between characters is effortlessly realistic too, never going overboard with the one-liners just for the sake of a quotable quote, all while retaining a light sense of humour through it all.

The heart of the film are Varun Dhawan and Anushka Sharma, of course, both of whom have managed to disappear into their roles with effortless ease. Mauji is one of the most interesting additions into Varun Dhawan’s roster of roles so far, a sincere, though unpolished everyman who has let his own ambition crumble under the weight of his family duties. In speech, in look and in mannerisms, Dhawan articulates beautifully as Mauji. It is Sharma who startles though, as the completely de-glammed Mamta, perpetually clad in a saree and
sindoor, conveying much more with her eyes and her expressions than with most of her dialogues. The earnestness that Sharma brings to the screen as Mamta in itself makes the character worth rooting for.

The only flaw with the film is how conveniently and simply Katariya slips into an almost fairy-tale ending for the film. While he stays realistic with the rest of the story, the ease with which Katariya puts a bow on the narrative doesn’t quite seem very believable. It isn’t that dreams don’t come true. They do. But do they come true so simply?

The last act notwithstanding though,
Sui Dhaaga is a film stitched together beautifully. All for Mauji, Mamta and their tireless drive to be “Made in India”, Sharat Katariya’s latest is worth the watch!

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